First off, full disclosure – I create courses for Pluralsight, so I stand to benefit if you become a customer. But since they are currently running a special promotion, I thought it might be a good time to explain why I am very glad to recommend them to you.

1) Seeing is a great way to learn

There are lots of ways to increase your programming skills, including books, blogs, attending conferences and hackathons, but one of the great things with Pluralsight courses is that you get to actually watch while someone uses the technology they are teaching. Sometimes with programming, seeing the finished code isn’t enough – we need to see the route taken to get there, so watching someone working step by step through a demo, explaining what they are doing as they go along is invaluable. Subscribers also get to download the source code for all demos, so you can always try to code it yourself while you watch, which I can recommend as a very effective way to cement what you are learning.

2) The catalogue is huge and diverse

Pluralsight has been around for a long time now, and multiple new courses are released most days. It means that almost whatever technology you want to learn, there will be something there for you. Whether you’re interested in the very latest SPA framework, or even if you’re stuck in legacy land working with something like WinForms, you’ll find there’s a choice of courses available.

3) Learn from recognized industry experts

One of the things that attracted me to Pluralsight in the first place was the quality of authors they had on board. Renowned conference speakers like Scott Allen, John Papa, or Dan Wahlin, as well as experts in their specialist domains like Troy Hunt on security, Julie Lerman on Entity Framework. It’s also a platform in which you discover some fantastic teachers you may not have come across before – a few whose courses I’ve particularly enjoyed recently are Elton Stoneman, Barry Luijbregts, Kevin Dockx, and Wes Higbee.

4) Paying will motivate you

In these days when so much technical content is available for free, it can be very tempting to decide that you can get by without paying anything. And to a certain extent that is possible. But by paying for a subscription not only will that mean you get a certain quality bar (which you don’t get when just randomly searching for YouTube or blog tutorials), but the very fact you are paying motivates you to learn in a way that free content doesn’t. It’s a bit like if you pay for piano lessons or gym membership – it adds that little bit extra incentive to actually do something and get some return on your investment.

5) Learning is fun, and good for your career

Finally, who wouldn’t want to improve their skills and learn new stuff? We have the privilege of working in an extremely interesting and fast-paced industry. By watching even just one course a month, you’ll pick up all kinds of helpful new techniques, which will improve you as a developer, making you more effective in your current role as well as more hireable if you are looking to move on.

About Mark Heath

I'm a Microsoft MVP and software developer based in Southampton, England, currently working as a Software Architect for NICE Systems. I create courses for Pluralsight and am the author of several open source libraries. I currently specialize in architecting Azure based systems and audio programming. You can find me on: